A beautiful thing about the internet nowadays is how it can create a community that otherwise wouldn’t be able to exist. And as we all strive for holiness, community is an essential part of our sanctification.
We’re not created by God to be alone, to live alone. We were created for communion.
Luigi Giussani wrote in The Religious Sense, “The human being experiences incomparable wholeness in companionship, in friendship.”
Community strengthens us, unites us in our faith, and is a way for us to become closer to God through others — similarly to how a husband and wife should lead one another to Christ, and how sisters of the same religious order also help lead one another another to God.
Through friendship and companionship, community exists as a way to develop our potential and to respond to our vocation. (CCC, 1879).
When I was in college, I was able to have this type of community — it existed in the Catholic dorm I lived in, which is one of the biggest Newman Centers on college campuses. After I graduated, I struggled to find that same type of community.
Now, a few years later, I have a good community once more in a few different ways — one of them being online.
I’m a part of a Catholic wives and moms group online, and it has been a huge blessing. It’s a place where some women give advice, and others ask for it; prayers are exchanged, and support is given. These women live all over the country, and some of them, outside of it. But when we’re all online together, it’s as though we’re all just a few houses away exchanging advice, friendship, and funny tales of the day.
What I have found most interesting, and comforting, about the group is what they seem to offer the most: solidarity.
I don’t mean that they simply show compassion or that they feel empathy for one another — which they do, but it is so much more than that.
As Saint John Paul II wrote, solidarity is, “a firm and preserving determination to commit oneself to the common good; that is to say to the good of all and of each individual, because we are really responsible for all.” (Sollicitudo Rei Socialis, The Social Concern).
These women are all Catholics dedicated to living out their faith, dedicated to their vocations as wives and mothers, and they’re all striving for holiness — not just for themselves, but for each other as well, as sisters in Christ.
This community is a safe place where we can share what’s going on in our lives, and ask for help as we strive to make it to Heaven with our families. Big or small, prayer requests are made — and prayed for, and others chime in with advice.
The prayers help, I know they help — there are testimonies of how the prayers have been answered in this group — but I also know that the solidarity offered brings a lot of comfort on its own; just knowing that someone has gone through what you’re going through, that they have experienced whatever you’re experiencing, that they know — even just a little bit — what your heart may be feeling.
Sometimes, that solidarity is even one of just understanding our fallen nature and the constant struggle we all face to let God reign in our lives.
We all need prayers, but when praying gets hard to do, when it’s hard to find the words to say, I personally find comfort in that solidarity — solidarity from these women, solidarity from the saints, and solidarity from Jesus Christ.
That’s one of the best parts of communities, in my opinion: solidarity, and its fruit, which is peace. (Solicitudo Rei Socialis, 39).
By being a part of this group (which isn’t the only community I’m a part of), I’m certain that I’m growing closer to God. By loving these women, and by them loving me, we are all reaching even closer to Him — because our love for our neighbors is inseparable from our love for God. (Catechism of the Catholic Church, 1878).
If you’re struggling to find community in your life, I recommend looking outside the box — and maybe you will be able to find it just a few clicks away. Don’t be limited by the notion that community can only occur in-person. In-person communion is always the best, but that doesn’t mean you should forego other opportunities that may be available. May the Holy Spirit guide you!
4 thoughts on “Strength from Solidarity”
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I am glad you have community and it is good for most people but Catholicism needs the opposite also. She kind of has that opposite in the Camaldolese hermits. We need individuals who stand up to group think. We recently had a clergy scandal that lasted 50 years and yet we had no lone heroes amidst the Magisterium ( neither Pope nor Bishop) who were strong like Elijah in the Old Testament …..who were individual enough to stand up to the system of episcopal silence in order to protect children. Think of it…we had no heroes in our most shameful crisis ever. You are correct that most people need community but Elijah was strong in his generation precisely because he was capable of being alone….and capable of thinking alone…and acting against the grain. And he remains the only human picked by God to return just prior to Christ’s second coming. Think of all the saints you like. None except Elijah were picked by God for that job.
This was just wonderful. I remember the first time I sat down and really thought about Heaven and the Communion of Saints and our future with God and each other. I realized that we are all deeply connected with God the Father, Jesus and Mary and all of the Saints and Angels and so much we don’t even know about yet! I laughed out loud and cried all at the same time because it’s so beautiful and so comforting and so filled with wonder! No one is ever alone once they realize this! Can you even begin to imagine what Heaven is going to be like? Thank you for this! God bless you!
Dear Annie-You have hit the nail on the head with your words. I try to rememer every time I say the word “us” in the Our Father and the Hail Mary that this is ALL of us, living and dead, on earth and in purgatory. And when I pay attention to the Mass, it is amazing how many references there are to the community of which you speak. Often I make this deal with people I meet, even when we both know we will never again encounter each other on this earth “You pray for me and my family, I’ll pray for you and your family.” Do we have a deal? Thank you for writing. Guy McClung San Antonio.ps: check it out – you are spreading pure St Thomas Aquinas re we being created for communion.